Plaid Worries
by Kiba Sniper
Summary: Franke worries about her skirt and asks Elka for her opinion.


Plaid Worries

"Hey, uh, can I ask you something?"

Elka dotted her sentence and raised her pen. She shook it, the ink having begun to run dry when Franke spoke. "What is it?"

Clearing her throat, Franke crossed her ankles and rocked her legs back and forth. She pinched the hem of her skirt and asked, "Does this, uh, look bad?" Her brows furrowed, her knuckles burning white as she tightened her grip. "Just say yes or no."

Her eyes widened as she sat up. She closed her spiral journal and placed it beneath her pillow. She certainly wasn't expecting such a question from Franke. Elka knew she talked about fashion only with Kitty, refusing any advice on clothing if it wasn't coming straight from her girlfriend.

The deep blue skirt covered just past Franke's knees. The crisscrossing yellow and red lines spread across her lap. Noticing the pleated fold, Elka was reminded of the school uniform she had to wear when she lived in Layton a couple years ago.

"I think it looks, um, maybe okay, " Franke mumbled, rubbing her neck.

"Yeah, I think so, too." Elka shrugged and clicked the end of her pen before tossing it onto her pillow. "It's a nice shade of blue."

She jerked her hand away as if a fly landed on her. Her mouth dropped open as she asked, "You don't think it's out of style?" Her voice cracked in the middle, which made Elka's small grin press into her cheek.

Chuckling, she hunched forward and set her elbows on to her knees. "Well, I think you can wear plaid with anything."

"It doesn't look too…" She let her words linger between them before a frown fixed itself to her face. She shook her head, dashing whatever it was she wanted to say. Pushing off her bunk, Franke snatched her navy blue backpack from underneath it. "Nah, nevermind. I'm just gonna change."

"Wait, what? Why? I said it looks nice," Elka said, a hint of irritation coating her words as she straightened her posture.

Franke tore open her bag and dumped wrinkled clothing onto her bed. She tossed shirts onto her pillow and pants towards her blanket, her expression hidden as she said, "Yeah but you're not Kitty." She held up a pair of faded jeans with a pink butterfly print on the back pocket only to scoff and throw it to the floor.

Rolling her eyes as Franke grumbled to herself, Elka withheld the urge to sigh. If any problem involved Kitty and fashion, criticism was the result. It seemed even Franke wasn't protected from her saccharinely snide comments despite her status as Kitty's girlfriend, but Elka knew the situation wasn't new. Thinking back, she remembered one of Kitty's ex-girlfriends sobbing into her pillow when she sneered that her nails were chipped and her Hollister shirt was "too tourist-y" with its bright red and white floral pattern.

"She must be right," Franke muttered as her bunkmate tapped her pen on her thigh, "I mean, she's always right about this stuff, so…"

As Franke flung a pair of socks to the floor, Elka said, "You know, if Kitty said it looked bad or whatever, then she's acting like Nils."

She hesitated, a pair of light purple shorts tightly wound in her grasp. "Uh, what are you talking about? Kitty is way cooler than Nils. In fact, Kitty is so much cooler 'cause-"

"No, no, you're missing my point." She shook her head and balled her hands into fists by her chest. "Did you know Nils had the gall to insult my clothes, too?"

"He did?" Franke scoffed and folded her shorts. "Well, he did make fun of my special shoes, too, so, I wouldn't put it past him."

Cupping her cheek, Elka continued as if she hadn't interjected. "I wore a plaid skirt last summer. It was this really nice shade of pink with red lines, and it had pockets with a lace trim, but he-! Ugh!" Throwing her arms up, she grit down on her molars and hissed, "He had the nerve to say I looked cheap. He said I should show more skin, but that would make me a-" She sucked down a breath as if someone had pinched her. "-make me a floozy. I'm not going to be like one of those girls he ogles at back in Long Beach."

"Seriously? Get out!" Franke dropped her shorts onto her backpack, her mouth still hanging open. "That's wicked skeevy! I knew he was a jerk, but man, that's mean."

"Right? And he's still the same pig a year later. God, I hoped he'd mature before camp, but look how wrong I was." She uttered a sigh, clasping her hands over her heart. "At least my dear James is so much more mature than him, and he appreciates my clothes. He said all my clothes looked 'unique' when I showed him the matching outfits we'd be wearing for the rest of the summer."

Franke hummed. She glanced at her clothing draped across the bed, each of them certainly going to be more wrinkled than they already were. Itching her scalp, she groaned, "But that's Nils, not Kitty. He doesn't have any fashion sense like Kitty, and she's the best at fashion."

"What I'm saying," she quickly interjected, shaking her head and standing up to pat her shoulder, "is that sometimes your significant other can have a totally wrong opinion. Nils has them all the time, you know."

"Even Kitty?"

"Even Kitty." She wanted to say 'especially Kitty,' but she wasn't sure how kindly Franke would take to that. "Sometimes her color combinations burn my eyes, but I wouldn't be so rude to say that to her face."

Slowly nodding, Franke pulled at her skirt and asked, "So, should I still wear it around Kitty?" Gasping, she broke into a wide grin and gripped her hips. "Oh, hey! Maybe she'll even think I'm super confident if I keep wearing it! It'll be like I'm strutting my stuff!"

She shrugged, not entirely convinced Kitty would be open to differing opinions. She almost had the nerve to mention it, but Franke had already started walking out of the cabin, her hands still on her hips like she was storming down the runway surrounded by flashing cameras. Shaking her head, she decided it was best to not ruin her fun when she had her own problems to journal about and reached for her pen.

"Hey! Wait a minute!"

Elka grimaced, centimeters away from grabbing her pen. She leered back at Franke, watching her stomp back over to her, her arms swinging like a soldier marching up the battlefield.

"Okay, what now?" she asked, her question punctuated with annoyance.

Shoulders hunching, Franke shot her finger at Elka's nose and snapped, "Don't think I'll let you get away with saying that!"

"Saying what?"

"Kitty's color choices are the best! You probably need glasses if you can't handle her chicness." A gleam appeared in her eyes, one Elka recognized as total adoration as Franke clenched her fists. "She compliments the best blues and pinks and greens and oranges, you know! You're just jealous 'cause you can't rock what she can rock!"

Slowly pushing Franke's arm down, she tightened her smile and said, "You know what? Wear whatever you want. Have fun."

Pivoting on her heels, she heaved out a silent sigh, feeling like Franke took her dismissal as a victory for her girlfriend. As Franke quickly stuffed her clothes into her backpack, she pulled out her journal again. She made herself comfortable on her bunk, positioning herself on her stomach and kicking the blankets towards the edge of the bed. Clicking her pen as Franke shoved her bag back under her bunk, she caught Franke skipping out with a smile on her face, a few pieces of clothing still discarded in the folds of her blanket.

In her journal, she made two final notes.

_P.S. Plaid skirts are still in no matter what those two rubes say, and oh, wow, I'm still using James' vocabulary! Goes to show how much closer I am with him than that stupid pig Nils._

_P.S.S. Avoid Kitty and her grenades like the plague that took out half of Europe._


End file.
